Colombian actress Sandra Melissa Torres was announced today winner of the Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award for her performance in the title role of Simón Mesa Soto’s debut feature Amparo, which had its world premiere in the international competition of the Critics’ Week at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival.
The film tells the story of Amparo, a single mother of two, who returns home following a long night’s shift, to find her children are not there. She soon finds out that her son has been drafted during an army raid and will be sent to the front in a notorious war zone near the border. His fate seems sealed. With only a single day left until his departure, Amparo manages to contact a man who offers to alter Elias' files and get him out. With nothing much on her side, she embarks on a race against time to free her son in a society ruled by corruption.
Born in Medellín , the 31-year-old Torres was working in an electrical appliance store until she was discovered by the director in a casting. The Nespresso Grand Prize for Best Film at the 60th edition of the Critics’ Week section was presented to the Egyptian film Feathers by Omar El Zohairi, and the jury was composed by Cristian Mungiu, Camelia Jordana, Didar Domehri, Michel Merkt and Karel Och.
